


Memories

by AlexiHollis



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Amnesia, Dad!Marcus Kane, F/F, Found Family, Trying to be a good mom but is still emotionally distant-ish!Indra, and its getting dark, but ethics seems to be a shady thing nowadays, but its not going to be explicitly promised, i mean i wouldn't think what abby's doing in this is ethical, i'm hopeful for a happy ending, kind of?, like a dark-ish idea but actually somewhat fluffy, probably medicine malpractice but honestly im not sure, some angst but not too angsty, this is longer than planned
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-27
Updated: 2017-04-10
Packaged: 2018-10-11 12:49:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10465419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlexiHollis/pseuds/AlexiHollis
Summary: After the world of the 100, those who die are reincarnated into a modern day world where they remember their previous life at the age of ten. Those who do not remember are sent to live in the communities. These people have formed their own separate society that the outsiders don't seem to understand, especially when the authorities in charge of protecting these communities allow for a research experiment on five of a community's teenagers for the sake of helping them remember.OrLexa, known by the community she lives in as Alicia Clark, has absolutely no interest in remembering her past life anymore, but she and her siblings were chosen for an experiment lead by Abby Griffin.





	1. Tenth Birthday

**Author's Note:**

> OKAY JUST SO THAT EVERYONE HAS A SORT OF "KEY"  
> Henri Clark: Marcus Kane  
> Adyna Clark: Indra  
> Tommy: Finn  
> Rych: Murphy  
> Ivy: Maya  
> Eli: Lincoln  
> Alicia: Lexa

There are certain things that are expected of you when you turn ten years old. You should be able to tie your own shoes and pick out your own clothes without looking like a clown. You should know the names of the colors and shapes around you. You should get along decently with your peers and have at least the most basic conflict resolution skills. You should be able to write a decent page about a given topic. You should remember your past life.

Lexa hit all of the milestones, went above and beyond, her teachers calling her an extraordinarily bright child, a joy to have in class, a remarkable influence on her peers, a natural born leader. She loved her family and even got along well enough with her sister. She had no reason to believed she would falter on what was expected of her so the morning of her tenth birthday, she searched to find what felt different. According to her older sister, Anya, remembering was like being hit by the trains Lexa listened to passing by her window before she went to sleep, that Anya woke up and expected to be somewhere entirely different, but the law prevented her from telling Lexa exactly where until she remembered herself. Her mother painted a gentler tale, explaining that she woke up and the details slowly trickled back to her, the water glass on her bedside table changing into one belonging in a different time. Her father didn’t talk about it, really, even when Lexa crawled onto his lap as he sat at his desk the night before her tenth birthday, already in her sleep clothes, but too anxious to lay still, but he did admit that the first thing he remembered was his last moments.

Remembering your last life was regarded as one of the most important moments in the process of becoming an adult. Yet Lexa woke up that morning, feeling no different than she had the night before, the anxious knot in her stomach tightening. She looked at the water glass she placed on her bedside table the night before, but it stayed the simple glass, one she’d drunken from most of her life. She listened to the sound of the trains, still rushing past her family’s farm, but nothing came to her. She remembered what her teacher had told her the day before, how he’d tried to recall memories of his childhood to realize he could reach even father than that, but when she tried, it remained the simple memory of racing down the dusty road in front of her house on her old, cherry red tricycle.

The knot in her stomach stretched and condensed at the same time as Lexa stared at the plain pop-corned ceiling above her. She’d heard of people who didn’t remember. Outcasts, practically shunned from society. Lexa fought back the tears pricking at the corners of her eyes. 

The door to her room suddenly slammed open and an uncharacteristically excited Anya stood in the doorway. Before Lexa could complain about her older sister’s habit of barging into her room unannounced, Anya said something, quick and garbled, almost resembling English enough to make Lexa believe her inability to decipher it could be morning grogginess.

“I’m sorry, can you say that again?” Lexa asked, rubbing at her forehead.

Anya seemed a little concerned, but repeated her question. Lexa cocked her head in confusion. She wasn’t speaking English, but it was too…structured to be gibberish and flowed just enough Lexa didn’t think Anya was playing a trick on her.

The excitement quickly drained from Anya, “You don’t understand me.”

It wasn’t a question, Anya knew that Lexa had no clue what she was saying. Her tone was bitter and angry, yet also disappointed in a way that didn’t help the increasing anxiety levels.

“You don’t remember,” Anya spat out, furious in the way only a teenager could be.

The knot in Lexa’s stomach moved into her throat. “I’m sorry.”

Anya merely shook her head, stomping out of the room, past Dad on the stairs and slamming the front door behind her.

“Hey, sport,” Dad smiled, yet clearly confused as to why his eldest had stormed out of the house. “How you-”

“I don’t remember,” Lexa mumbled, looking down at the quilt still covering her.

The room went silent, until heavy footfalls made its way to her bedside. He knelt down beside her, a large hand on her back.

“Are you sure?” He was scared, Lexa could see it in his eyes.

Lexa nodded, fighting against the tears. She’d never seen Dad scared before and she quickly decided she didn’t like it. “What’s going to happen, now?”

Dad sighed, rubbing calming circles into her back, before explaining, “You have two weeks. After those two weeks, mom and I have to report this is to the authorities.”

“But I didn’t do anything wrong,” Lexa hated how her voice trembled.

“I know, I know,” Dad assured. “It’s just…there are people who can help you. You’re ten now, people are going to assume you remember the past and we all did things that some people might want to…question us about. However, you can’t answer those questions and that makes people angry.”

“Am I going to get sent away?”

“We’ll see what happens.”

Breakfast was tense. Mom had made waffles in celebration, Lexa’s favorite breakfast, but that morning she hated the way they settled in her stomach. Anya sat across the table from her, not touching anything as she glared at Lexa. The moment the high school bus arrived, Anya all but sprinted out the room as Lexa fought the tears once again threatening to fall down on her already cold, soggy food.

The two weeks passed slowly, but once they arrived, Lexa wanted them back. Officers from the Reincarnation Agency came not even fifteen minutes after Dad had made the phone call that morning, but Anya was already gone by the time they showed up. She’d elected to ride her bike. The head officer was a woman with a pinched face who handed Lexa a plastic trash bag to pack her things, but took it back once Dad assured her that Lexa was allowed to take real suitcases with her, especially as they’d already been packed. She was allowed a quick goodbye, barely a hug and a kiss on the forehead before being shuffled into the back of the car. On the way out of town, they passed by the high school where Lexa saw Anya locking in her bike. They made eye contact and, for the moment she could see her big sister, it seemed that Anya was almost as heartbroken as her.

The drive was long, the sun having set nearly half an hour prior by the time they reached large gate that the driver had to swipe a key card to enter. Inside were nice neat homes with small front lawns bordered by picket fences. The windows were large on the downstairs floors, smaller upstairs, and each were brightly lit. One showed a family of six eating dinner, another showed an older man and a boy appearing to be around twelve roughhousing in a living room. It wasn’t the large gray institution Lexa had been imagining. They turned down one of the cul-de-sacs, pulling up to the house on the end. Like the others, it was brightly lit inside, Lexa could see two boys, a girl a bit older than her and an older woman all watching some sports game on the TV screen while, off to the side, a man and a different boy read a book. An officer opened the car door and Lexa stepped out timidly as the other roughly yanked her bag out of the trunk. Leading her to the house, the first officer knocked on the door, loud and obnoxious in the quiet neighborhood.

The door opened to the man. He was tall with kind eyes and a scruffy beard. Behind him, a lanky boy almost hid behind him, only poking out his head to watch the interaction.

“We called ahead,” the officer sounded bored. “Here’s the girl,” Lexa was pushed closer to the threshold as her bag was tossed onto the floor at the kind man’s feet.  “Here’s her stuff. As usual you will be given extra money to pay for food and other necessities. Good night.” With that, the officers turned and went back to their car, driving off without even letting the man say a word.

Lexa looked up at the man who smiled brightly.

“Nice to meet you, Lexa.” He picked her bag up off the ground. “Come inside, it’s getting cold out there.” He wasn’t wrong. It was well into October and the summer nights had yielded to the chilly autumn evenings that had Mom making hot chocolate almost nightly before bed. Could she even call her mom anymore? Was that okay or had Lexa crossed the line? Did her old life mean anything in this strange new town, living amongst strangers? She stepped inside.

“Rych, why don’t you go watch the game?” The man gestured to the living room where the woman was the only one watching what was happening near the front door, the other three on the floor, cross legged, engrossed in the basketball game on screen. The lanky boy, Rych, seemed unhappy to be sent away, but reluctantly left to sit on couch, leaning against the woman. “Come along, Lexa.”

The man climbed up the narrow, steep wooden staircase to the second floor. Along the wall were pictures of the children and the family they’d created, starting at a picnic when evidently the eldest boy first arrived. Lexa didn’t waste too much time as the man was already at the top of the stairs. At the top, she realized the cramped yet homey nature of the second floor, with a somewhat low ceiling and barely any hallway space. There were six doors, four with names on them, Lexa recognizing the name Rych on one, not including the door that was open to reveal the small bathroom. The man led her to one of the rooms without a name, opening it to reveal a decent sized bedroom with a twin bed pushed into one corner with a bedside table and reading light. There was a simple desk underneath the window that already had a lamp and wastepaper basket. A wooden dresser was across the room from the foot of the bed. It was a nice room, but it wasn’t her room. Lexa silently thanked Dad (Dad?) for having packed her quilt and convincing her to bring along her old stuffed animals.

“So, this is your room,” the man explained. “Adyna and I sleep in the room down the hall. Once you choose your new name, you can put it on the door, really make it your’s.”

“My…new name?” Lexa cocked her head, confused. “I-I like my name.”  
“Oh, dear,” The man’s face became concerned. “Has no one talked to you about this?”

Lexa shook her head.

“Oh. Oh, no.” The man seemed alarmed. “You do know that you’ll be living here now, right?”

No one had explicitly told her that, but she’d assumed, so Lexa nodded. “Thank goodness. Still, I’ve never seen a kid given so little explanation by the time they’ve been brought here. Sit down, sit down.” He gestured to the bed. Lexa sat, her feet dangling off the sides, barely hovering over the floor. The man sat down in the desk chair, facing her.

“Do you know how you were named?” The man asked. Lexa shook her head. “Well, I don’t know how to explain this properly since a lot of details have been withheld from me, but when you’re born, the hospital figures out who you were in the previous life. They name you the name you had before in hopes of increasing the chances that you’ll remember when you turn ten. It also puts a bar about that person in public discussion, such as in the news and in movies and books, for ten years. Past that, your parents are in charge of making sure you don’t learn anything about your past life before you remember, but you already know that. Those of us who end up not remembering, for reasons still unknown, are moved to these separate communities. They really aren't bad, though, I promise. We have our own schools, including some top of the line colleges, hospitals, and forms of entertainment. We do have the internet that, albeit, is restricted to only allow content created in our communities around the world and censored outside media. You can travel freely among these different communities through the subway systems. Either way, when you come here, you are asked to choose a new name, because the name you have no longer suits you. You will never be Lexa, because you don’t remember Lexa, but that is not a bad thing.”

“The older kids called me a murderer,” Lexa murmured. When news got out that Lexa turned ten and didn’t remember, the kids took on the reactions their parents had. Many of them viewed not remembering as a form of killing the old soul.

The man sighed, “Yes, people can be particularly cruel to those who they do not understand.”

“What’s your name, sir?” Lexa asked.

“Henri,” he answered. “Henri Clark, but you can just call me Henri, none of that sir business.” Henri sensed the question before she asked, “My name was Marcus Kane.” Lexa nodded. “Okay, let me give you a rundown.” He pulled a wallet out of his back pocket, opening it to reveal a family photo inside. “This is Adyna,” he pointed to the woman. “Her name used to Indra.”

“Are you married?” Lexa asked.

Henri laughed slightly at the question. “No, no. Neither of us were interested in marriage, but we did want a family, so we just signed up to be Parents together. Sleep in separate beds and everything, but she is my best friend.” He pointed to the oldest boy, “That’s Eli, used to go by Lincoln, he just turned twelve.” He moved on to the lanky boy, “I think you already know Rych. He hated his old name, John Murphy, and was actually somewhat too happy to let it go. He’s eleven. Tommy’s almost twelve, and I’m pretty sure his name was Finn. And that’s Ivy,” Henri’s finger finally landed on the only girl. “She’s sensitive about her name: Maya. She’ll be eleven soon.”

Lexa looked down at the picture, reminded of the family portrait her mother had insisted on getting done that summer. Lexa had complained, especially when her mother forced her into a dress, and in the end her unhappiness could be sensed through the photo. In this picture, though, they all had on bright smiles, except for Adyna, who’s smile was small and close lipped, but she already got the feeling that that may just be who she was. Ivy was wearing a fluffy pink dress while Rych still had on sleep clothes, Tommy wore a soccer uniform still covered in dirt and Eli wore a simple button down and tie. This hodge-podge of people were clearly happy to be there, proud to have a picture taken of _their_ family. Lexa thought of the small, wallet sized photo, the only one she could grab in time, stuffed into her bag, of her family portrait. She may not have been happy at the time, but that was her family, how could she ever fit into this one?


	2. Outsiders

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> New faces in town interrupt the lives of the Clark family

_Six Years Later_

The family sat around the table, the teenagers fighting over portions of food while Henri and Adyna waited for them to settle before serving themselves. Once everyone was sated, Adyna cleared her throat. 

“Did anyone do anything interesting today?”

“I almost broke my nose during soccer practice today,” Tommy shrugged, eating his meatloaf.

Henri choked on the water he was drinking, causing Alicia to laugh slightly. He was always the more paranoid of the two, fretting over every scratch and scar. “I thought soccer was a strictly non-contact sport?”

“It is,” Tommy assured. “I just happened to have contact with the goal post.”

“How the hell are you on the team?” Eli asked, having put his fork down, staring at his younger brother in shock. Tommy just shrugged.

“Well, I got a B on my History paper,” Ivy smiled, proud of herself. “Dr. Bennet finally thinks I’m actually a decent student.”

“Whoopdeedoo,” Rych moved his fork in a circle as he slouched in his chair, poking at his meatloaf. He hated meatloaf. 

Ivy rolled her eyes, “Oh, yea? What’d you do today, then?”

Rych smirked, “I got full marks on _my_ History essay.”

“Mother-!”

“Father,” Henri jumped in, sending Ivy a warning glance as she glared across the table at Rych.   
“It’s all about finesse,” Rych grinned.

“You little,” Henri sent Ivy a cautionary glance, “jerk-face.”

“Very creative,” Ivy stuck her tongue out at Rych.

“What did you do today, Alicia?” Adyna asked, turning to the youngest sitting at the edge of the table, eating quietly.

Alicia hummed to herself quietly, trying to think of anything noteworthy. “You know the cul-de-sac across town, near the park?” Everyone nodded, suddenly intrigued. The cul-de-sac had been empty since Adyna and Henri first moved into Pleasantview, their community, mainly because it was so isolated from the rest of the houses, closer to the lake and surrounded by the park land. Community members preferred to actually be apart of the community. “I think families are moving in to some of the houses.”

“Really?” Eli asked, shocked. “Like, full families?”

“I don’t know of any Families relocating here.” Adyna worked at the Pleasantview police station, it was her job to know everyone in the community, where they lived and if anyone new was coming.

Alicia shrugged, “I only really saw the moving vans.” She mulled over her next words, knowing they’d raise some questions. “…they came in through the gates.”

“What the hell were you doing by the gates?” Adyna demanded, fork and knife down as she fully addressed Alicia. Community members were advised to stay away from the gates to ensure the officers who guarded the borders didn't mistake them for trying to leave.

“I wasn’t near the gates!” Alicia promised.

“This time,” Rych muttered under his breath. 

“Dude, shut up,” Tommy kicked Rych under the table. To everyone’s surprise, Rych didn’t retaliate.

“So how do you know they came through the gates?” Henri asked, trying to keep a level head.

“I was climbing a tree in the park and I saw the tops of the gates open,” she explained, allowing Adyna to relax a little.

“There was a block set up around the gates, today,” Adyna said. “They wouldn’t tell us if it was a new kid, so it may have been these Families.”

“But why?” Eli asked, looking suddenly concerned.

“I’m not sure,” Adyna’s voice sounded uneasy, never a good sign from the typically stoic woman.

“Did something happen again?” Ivy asked, voice small as she voiced everyone’s concerns and Alicia regretted talking about the new families.

A little more than a year earlier, an entire community in the south, known as Belle Reve, was burnt to ground in the middle of the night during the tail end of August. A brand new officer had been taking the night shift guard of the community’s borders alone as some sort of hazing ritual, despite regulations stating there should be at least three officers on duty at once, with one high ranking officer. Being so new, however, the officer still believed his job to be keeping in the citizens of the community and never saw the arsonists sneaking under the fence in a tunnel that must have taken months to dig, letting out into the forested area of the community’s park. When buildings began to burn, starting with the fire department, some citizens raced to put out the fires while others ushered children away. It was a fairly new community, most of the population being pre-teens and teenagers. However, the fires quickly became unmanageable as it seemed that once one building stopped burning, three more took its place. Citizens ran to the gates, begging them to be opened, but the officer, unsure of what to do and worried that this may have been a “mass orchestrated trick into being allowed to escape” (his exact words when put on trial), refused to open the gates until he could contact a superior officer. Only about eighty people in a community of five hundred survived. What irked Alicia the most, even more than the incompetent officers, was how every article written by those on the outside focused on the one “good” thing to come out of such tragedy: how a twelve year old named Charlotte, reverting back to the name she was given, remembered her past life perfectly after her assigned family burned to death. Alicia quickly stopped reading the non-censored articles written by the outsiders when it came to matters regarding the communities; they only ever annoyed her, written from a perspective so disconnected from the communities themselves. They seemed to believe that the citizens thriving within each community’s walls spent their entire lives “aching to be free”, “dying to remember who they used to be”.

“No, we would have heard if something happened,” Henri promised before looking at Alicia. “That is very interesting, though.”

Before anyone could say anything else, however, there was a knock at the door.

“What have I said about guests at dinner?” Henri asked, looking at Tommy, the only one who broke the rule on a semi-regular basis. 

“It’s not me this time!”

“It’s _always_ you.”

“Okay, why the hell are you being such a jerk today, Rych?!”

“He has a point, you do have people over a lot during dinner.”

“Who’s side are you on Eli?!”

“I’ll go get the door,” Alicia excused herself, standing from her chair and walking to the front door. 

Without looking through the peephole, she opened it to see a woman around Adyna’s age.

“Um,” Alicia looked back at the dining room table, everyone once again falling silent. Henri took the hint and began to make his way to the door. “Hello?”

“Hi,” The woman greeted, her smile a bit too big. “I was told this was the home of the Clark family?”

“Yes, it is!” Henri said cheerfully, relieving Alicia of having to hold the door open. His arm stretched across her, shielding her slightly from the unexpected visitor. “I am Henri Clark. Can I help you with something?”

“My name is Dr. Abby Griffin,” the woman introduced. “I was wondering if it would be alright if I could come in and have a conversation with your family regarding your children.”

“Well, we just sat down for dinner-”

“I’m from the Reincarnation Agency,” the doctor interrupted. “Your children have been selected to participate in a research project in the efforts to help them remember their past lives.” Henri and Alicia stood at the door, shocked into silence. “It would be in your best interest to let me in so I can explain.”

They congregated in the living room. Alicia had never questioned the size of her home, until this outsider invaded it. Now, instead of feeling comfortable and warm, it neared on claustrophobic.

“It’s a completely noninvasive experiment,” the doctor began after having prefaced the point of the experiment to the rest of Alicia’s family. “We’ve chosen you five because we happen to know a good deal about your lives as well as access to people who were important to you. The idea is that a slow reintroduction to these people, to things you encountered, might jog your memory.”

“Okay, first: that doesn’t sound _noninvasive_ to me,” Rych began. “Secondly: you know _nothing_ about _my_ life. Lastly: I’m pretty sure this has been tried already.”

“Something along these lines has been attempted before,” Dr. Griffin explained. “However, not to the extremes we wish to go as well as…well, a new element has been added to this…hypothesis.” At the blank looks of confusion, she sighed. “While we reintroduce you to things from your past life, you will also be undergoing an incredibly light version of chemotherapy.”

“You’re going to poison us to try and force us to remember,” Alicia reiterated. Dr. Griffin winced slightly.

“Again with the noninvasive?” Rych pointed out.

“Rych, noninvasive by doctor standards means no major surgery,” Eli grumbled, sick of his brother’s comments.

“Um, I count chemotherapy along the same lines as a major surgery,” Tommy interjected.

“Quiet,” Adyna sighed. “Dr. Griffin, thank you for the opportunity, but this is not something I am willing to put my kids through.”

“You don’t really have choice,” Dr. Griffin explained, obviously unsettled by the lack of enthusiasm. “But we are incredibly optimistic about the end results! We’ve chosen teenagers because their bodies will have a less long-lasting affects, but this might be a wide-spread solution.”

“You say that as if you think if this was available to me, I’d want to go through it,” Adyna’s voice was solid and cold.

“I…cannot claim to know what you would do,” Dr. Griffin corrected herself. “However, this is Reincarnation Agency mandated.” She handed Adyna a letter and a small business card with an address on it that Alicia couldn’t fully make out. “It starts tomorrow at noon. Your children have been waved from school until the end of the experiment. I trust you know where that is?”

“Yes, I do,” Adyna almost growled. Alicia peeked at the card-it was one of the houses in the cul-de-sac near the park.

That night, Alicia struggled to fall asleep, tossing and turning. As the clock on her bedside table read two o’clock, her door creaked open. A lanky figure slunk through the door. Sighing and half-expecting such events, Alicia scooted over to the wall, letting Rych crawl into her bed. They stared up at the ceiling.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Rych offered by way of explanation, but he hadn’t needed to, she understood. This wasn’t an isolated incident, though, having started way back when Alicia first arrived. The walls weren’t thick and Rych could hear her sniffling as she fought crying herself to sleep while he just couldn’t sleep.

“Do you want to remember?”

Rych was silent for a moment. “I thought I did, when I was younger.” We all did. “But I haven’t thought about it in a while.” Why focus on something you couldn’t change? It wasn’t like living in the community was awful. “I don’t know now.”

They fell back into silence and, when Alicia was certain her brother was asleep, light snores confirming her belief, she whispered into her dark bedroom: “I don’t think I do.”

* * *

 

The next day at noon, Henri drove them to the once empty cul-de-sac, past the trees Alicia climbed the day before that suddenly felt like a long time ago. Her backpack was sitting in the corner of the room it usually inhabited during the summer months and she couldn’t deny the joy of not having to do the pre-calculus homework that was due Monday. They pulled up to the house in the middle of all the others. Most were still empty, but in front of three, all in a row, were stacks of cardboard boxes and bubble wrap waiting to be collected on garbage day. Alicia wondered if they knew it wouldn’t be picked up until Friday.

Climbing out of the car, they made their way to the house in the middle, the one matching the address handed to Adyna who wanted to be with them, but Henri convinced to go to work instead.

Henri hadn’t even knocked on the door before it was pulled open to reveal a much cheerier Dr. Griffin.

“Good afternoon!” She smiled. “Come in, come in. We’ll begin right away!”

Eli went in first, it was almost comical to watch him enter as he towered over the doctor. Ivy followed after him, Rych on her heels. Tommy, sensing Alicia’s nerves, put an arm around her shoulders and led her into the house. Yet when Henri tried to enter, Dr. Griffin blocked him. 

“I’m sorry, Mr. Clark,” She apologized. “But I can’t have you coming in.” Henri’s eyebrows raised, ready to argue, but Dr. Griffin continued, “It’s a very sensitive experiment. We don’t want to risk contamination.”

“When should I come pick up my kids then?” Henri’s voice was tense.

“Six o’clock.”

Henri nodded, before looking at his kids. “You all be good.”

“We’ll be fine,” Eli promised, sending him a reassuring smile before Dr. Griffin closed the door.

The house was eerily similar to their own, Alicia noted as she looked around, though it wasn’t surprising. Community houses were mass produced, funded by the government. Everything they had belonged to the government. Dr. Griffin led them to the living room that had two large couches facing each other. The couch along the far side of the room was occupied by five teenagers that Alicia didn’t recognize.

“Please take a seat,” Dr. Griffin gestured to the empty couch.

They all did, Rych and Tommy on either side of Alicia.

“So, I’ve already explained the basis of this experiment to you,” Dr. Griffin said. “These are the people who you will be going through this with. They were important to you, once upon a time. Lincoln, you-”

“My name is Eli,” Eli said firmly.

The slight brunette sitting on the couch across from them seemed a little shocked at the assertion, asking “What do you mean?”

“Eli is my name,” Eli explained once again. “I chose it when I first moved here; we all give up our birth names.”

“To help with the experiment, you will be called by your actual names,” Dr. Griffin’s grin turned tight. “I can’t control what you call yourselves outside of the six hours you are here, but while you are here, that is what you will be called.”

“Are you fuc-”Rych stood up angrily only for Alicia to pull him down harshly.

“We understand,” She said quickly, glaring at an angry Rych, fuming next to her.

“All right, then.” Dr. Griffin nodded. “Lincoln,” She had the gall to stress the name, “you will be with Octavia, she will show you to your experiment room.” The slight brunette stood up, leading Eli out of the room. Tommy tried to protest, but Eli stopped him with a shake of his head. They couldn’t fight this. “Finn,” Tommy rolled his eyes at the use of his birth name. “You are with Raven.” The Latina girl stood up and Tommy left as well. “Maya,” Ivy visibly flinched from the use of her name, “meet Jasper.” A boy with fluffy hair and a nervous smile guided her out of the room. “John Murphy, Bellamy.” Rych was mumbling curses under his breath the entire way out. “Lexa,” Alicia could barely remember the last time someone called her that name, couldn’t remember the last time she wanted to be called Lexa. She missed the way that Dr. Griffin’s voice went soft around her name, the pity in her eyes as she glanced at the blonde teenager standing from the couch.

“I’m Clarke,” the blonde smiled sadly, offering her hand to help Alicia stand.

She ignored it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm hoping you guys are liking this. This stories going to be short-ish, getting myself back into writing more regularly. Plus this idea has been swimming around my head for forever now. I'm excited to get it on paper (document? whatever).  
> PLEASE PLEASE GIVE KUDOS AND REVIEW THEY MEAN THE F*ING WORLD TO ME


	3. First Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The experiment begins, but doesn't yield pleasant results for anyone.

It did not take Alicia long at all to decide that she was going to hate this. The room Clarke lead her to on the second floor was the same size as her room at home, yet the tile flooring, the wall covered by a mirror, the blacked out window made it seem so much larger. And colder. Definitely colder. In the middle of the room, there was a chair more fitting for a doctor’s office, clearly designed to be the most comfortable it could be, yet only made Alicia uneasy as she sat down and all but sank into it. On the left side of the chair was an IV drip labeled chemotherapy ready to be stuck into Alicia’s arm. Two rolling stools were also in the room, one that Clarke sat in and rolled up next to Alicia.

The girl was unlike the teenagers Alicia knew in the community. Instead of the smiles and general air of cheer or even the sullenness expected of puberty, Clarke seemed too old for her own body. Although, Alicia speculated, that was sort of the case. She thought back to her own biological sister who, after her tenth birthday, was treated as another adult. Though Alicia had, in the beginning, clung to the memories of her former family, things slipped through the cracks. She couldn’t remember the way her father called her “sport” or the smell of her mother’s favorite perfume. In all honesty, Alicia couldn’t recall exactly which ways Anya changed after her birthday, she had been only five when that happened. Yet Alicia couldn’t believe that all outsiders carried the same sorrow Clarke did, the depression that pressed on her shoulders and caused hesitance in her gait. The worst part were her eyes, a blue that Alicia could be lead to believe was once vibrant and bright, now dull and reminiscent of prison gates.

“Have I mentioned I hate doctors?” Alicia didn’t know when she decided to speak, only that she hated the way Clarke appeared in such despair, definitely the most dismal figure Alicia had ever seen.

Clarke jumped slightly, letting out a low chuckle as she looked at Alicia, her head tilted to the side with a sad bemused grin.

“No,” she shook her head. “You haven’t.”

“Well, I do,” Alicia nodded. She had already started talking, why stop now? “And honestly this is _not_ helping. God, Mom’s going to have a field day trying to get me into my annual next year.”

“…Mom?” Clarke asked.

“Yea, my mom, Adyna,” Alicia didn’t notice Clarke’s subtle confusion. “Dad takes my brothers, mom takes Ivy and me.”

“Oh. You mean Adyna and Henri Clark?” The names come strangely from Clarke’s lips. Alicia realizes where she lost Clarke.

“They’re my parents.”

“What about your real parents?” Clarke quickly begins to back track at seeing the fire in Alicia’s eyes at the question. “I mean-uh, birth parents?”

Alicia ran a hand through her thick hair, sighing heavily. She didn’t particularly want to expose this to some outsider who wouldn’t understand, probably didn’t even want to understand. She wondered if Clarke had ever seen a child being driven away to a community, never to return. Did Clarke pity them? Alicia didn't want her pity, or anyone's pity for that matter. She had a loving family, a nice house, and a community she loved. Of course she missed her birth family, but she didn't want to miss people who didn't miss her. Wasn't she stronger than that?

“I haven’t had any sort of contact with them in six years.” Her voice was strong, but small. Almost a whisper in the room.

“Because you aren’t allowed to have contact with those on the outside.” Clarke finished. "But that isn't their fault, they still care about you." Evidently, Clarke wasn't closely related to any member of a community.

“That's a misconception, actually. I can’t contact them, but they are allowed to contact me,” Alicia explained. “They know what community I live in, they could send letters. We technically have visitation days once a month.” Alicia scoffed a little, no one ever got visitors. Not even the ten year olds. “They didn’t try. I mean, I guess I understand. My biological sister, Anya, took the news pretty hard.”

“So you disowned them?” It wasn’t really a question, but it wasn’t a statement either.

Alicia shrugged, not willing to commit to an answer. She still felt connected to them, but...they weren't her family. Not really.

Before Clarke could press on her indecisiveness, the door opened, letting in Dr. Griffin, now in a white lab coat and holding a clip board, along with a man in his early twenties, most likely a lab assistant, pushing a cart filled with medical supplies or, as they appeared to Alicia, legal instruments of torture.

“Hello, Lexa,” Dr. Griffin smiled. How could a smile be so condescending?

The lab assistant moved to Alicia’s right, where the IV drip was situated and roughly grabbed Alicia’s arm without even giving her a second look. Before she could complain, Clarke was out of her chair.

“Don’t touch her like that,” Clarke hissed, after having pushed the man away from Alicia, sending him stumbling against the wall.

“Clarke!” Dr. Griffin exclaimed, scandalized. “You cannot push my assistants around like that! He needs to hook up the IV to Lexa, you know that.”

Clarke merely glared at the man who hesitantly got to his feet. “He could’ve asked first. She isn’t some sort of lab rat.”

Alicia sat in the chair with wide eyes. She’d never considered Clarke unassuming, she held this air of power that Alicia couldn’t quite name, but this was unexpected.

“Can we just get this over with?” She asked after a few moments as the tension in the room refused to alleviate.

Clarke huffed under her breath, still glaring at the assistant as she took her seat. He made his way back to Alicia’s side.

“Can I have your arm, please?” He asked this time. Alicia all but threw her arm at him, ready to move past a situation she definitely did not understand.

She knew that Clarke was supposed to have been important to her, once upon a time in a land far, far away. It was weird, though, to see Clarke so defensive of her, especially when Alicia felt like she’d just met her barely even a half hour ago. Alicia used to wonder exactly what remembering felt like after you became used to it. Did it feel like memories that occurred years prior? Was it weird to have that noticeable gap between your death and your rebirth, for no one could remember their earliest years? How did emotions translate over all those years? These questions resurfaced as the assistant stuck the IV into her arm, but she kept silent. Once Alicia was settled, poison pumping into her veins and Clarke at her side, watching her intently, Dr. Griffin handed her a clipboard with papers already clipped.

“Jackson here,” Dr. Griffin gestured to her assistant, “is going to be taking notes throughout this whole process. I will be in my office watching through the cameras,” she gestured to the security camera in the corner, “taking my own. You and Clarke are going to go through this page and, once you finish, begin talking about whatever questions you may have and hopefully, you start to fill in the blanks on your own. Later, we’ll have a group discussion and then Henri will be here to pick you up. Any questions?”

“Yea, actually I do,” Alicia shifted slightly in her seat. “Did this new hypothesis of your happen to have anything to do with what happened after the burning of Belle Reve?”

"I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you mean," Dr. Griffin kept her voice even, but her posture tightened just slightly.

“I mean, you’re putting our bodies under stress, like that girl’s body was and then telling us facts about people we don’t know, trying to force us to know them, therefore making us also distraught. It seems somewhat similar,” Alicia continued.

“Charlotte remembered because she’d lost her family in her past life at the same age,” Dr. Griffin explained. “We are hoping to trigger a similar reaction. So, yes, our hypothesis came out of a terrible tragedy. However, that does not invalidate this experiment, nor does it villainize myself or anyone trying to help you. Any more questions?"

Alicia shook her head, despite beginning to imagine what Dr. Griffin would look like twirling a cartoon villain mustache. 

“I will leave you two to work, then.” Dr. Griffin quickly left the room, almost slamming the door behind her.

“Let’s get started then,” Clarke grabbed the clipboard. She cleared her throat before reading, “Your name is Lexa.”

Alicia threw her head back against the chair, resisting the urge to groan. This was going to be _so much fun_.

Clarke began reading through the list, but the process was slow going. For one, she read each line carefully, pronouncing each word as its own sentence as if to make sure Lexa understood the meaning of every syllable. They stayed on the first “Your name is Lexa” line for a good fifteen minutes as Clarke waited for Alicia to complete the name. At first, she just went with Woods, but that gave Clarke a great deal of false hope before realizing that was the last name she was given at birth. Though it did give Alicia the clue that her past name must’ve been similar. Her next guess was Forrest, but that wasn’t right either. Eventually, getting annoyed with being read the same sentence, she started giving nonsense answers like Pine and Mushroom. Clarke eventually relented, but Alicia couldn’t help but feel a pang in her chest at her look of disappointment; she blamed that on Clarke being an admittedly extremely attractive girl while Alicia was an admittedly extremely gay girl. However, nearing on the hour mark, in which they were barely a fifth down the page, Alicia began to feel extremely nauseous. She’d anticipated this, of course, but she hadn’t prepared herself for exactly _how_ nauseous. In a span of two seconds, she became lime green and Jackson had barely enough time to thrust a rubbish bin under her chin before she began losing what little food she’d eaten that day. Clarke quickly replaced him, holding the bin and perching on the bed, a hand resting on Alicia’s back. Once she stopped being violently ill, Alicia leant onto Clarke, too tired to object, energy completely spent and on the verge of tears only held back by pride.

“This shouldn’t be happening,” Alicia could barely hear Clarke hiss her words to Jackson. “How much are you giving her?” She couldn’t hear Jackson’s response. Clarke’s jacket was suddenly extremely soft and her shoulder the perfect place to take a nap. “For the love of-she is tiny, she can’t handle that much!” Alicia moaned slightly at the shout which Clarke, luckily, interpreted correctly, lowering the volume of her voice. “Go get my mother.” A beat. “Now, Jackson!”

However, Dr. Griffin must’ve been waiting at the door because she was in the room in seconds. Or maybe Alicia was more delirious than she thought.

“I’m very sorry, Lexa,” Dr. Griffin apologized. Alicia wasn’t sure what for until her eyelids were being forced open and a flashlight shined directly into them. Yea, apology not accepted. “She’s much smaller than we anticipated.” Alicia heard the sound of papers rustling. “She must be a late bloomer,” Dr. Griffin mused. “She was five foot eight when she was twenty-two last time.”

“She’s not supposed to know that yet,” Clarke reminded.

Dr. Griffin laughed a little, actually somewhat cheerful, “Clarke, I doubt Lexa knew what her height was in her past-life.” A pause. “Also, I’m not sure she’s hearing anything we say right now. That must've been hell on her body, I should've noticed that sooner.”

“I was in the room, I got distracted, it's my fault.” Clarke muttered, running a hand through Alicia’s hair. Alicia didn’t want to admit it, not even to herself, but it did feel good. "It's my fault, again."

"Clarke," Dr. Griffin's voice sounded a strange mixture of pity and reprimanding. Clarke continued to stroke her hair; Alicia couldn't believe how nice it felt, she usually hated people playing with her hair, but this felt bizarrely calming.

Actually, it felt familiar.

Alicia quickly pulled away from Clarke, passing it off by rolling over onto her other side and groaning slightly, eyes screwed shut.

“I’ll call Henri,” Dr. Griffin sighed. “Let him pick her up early; we’ll fix her dosage for tomorrow.”

Oh, great. Tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why do I like to torture my favorite characters? Why give Lexa back to Clarke yet make Lexa forget everything? Why am I doing this to myself and you, darling readers???  
> PLEASE LEAVE KUDOS AND/OR A COMMENT!!! I LOVE THEM! THEY MAKE ME SMILE!!!


	4. The Merge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Communities thrive until outsiders get involved.

It wasn’t working. Of course, Alicia began the experiment doubtful of its results, but doing the same thing every day, reading the same list because they could not move forward until she volunteered extra information, became unbearably taxing. Became tedious and worrisome and a whole number of things that made Alicia dread noon and ache for six o’clock.

It’d been a month. One long month of no changes. Of course, Alicia wasn’t allowed to know of any progress (or lack of it) being made by her siblings, but she remained stagnant. The “group discussions” were less discussions and more staring at a power point slide, being shown pictures, calling out the first thing to pop into your head. Ivy stopped attending these around the end of the first week, so maybe the experiment was working on her. Ivy stopped doing a lot of things, though.

She stopped talking at dinner time. To be honest, no one really talked at dinner time anymore. Henri would ask nervously cheerful questions, probing but trying to appear not; Adyna stayed at the station longer and longer. She stopped barging into Alicia’s room, demanding to braid her hair. The thing that stood out the most, though, was when the piano in Ivy’s room stopped being played. The first time she skipped her daily practice, Alicia opened the door to check on her, but couldn’t find her sister anywhere. Instead, a stranger of a girl sat in Ivy’s rocking chair, looking out the window as if seeing it for the first time. The stranger had Ivy’s hair and eyes, the perfect imposter, but Alicia struggled to find any semblance of her sister in them. Alicia quietly left the room, but the stranger began to appear more frequently: hesitant upon going outside, always gazing out windows and having a strange appreciation for art other than music.

Maybe the experiment was working, but maybe only by Dr. Griffin’s standards.

* * *

 

It was a normal day. Alicia was getting sick of the routine, but it was a normal day and she did enjoy when Clarke would eventually give up on the list and begin talking to her like an actual human being. At first, it was a little awkward, as things always seemed to be with Clarke, but it got better with time. It was definitely better than struggling to remember details of a life long gone.

“Finally!” Alicia cheered, moving around just slightly in her seat, as Clarke handed the paper to a bored Jackson. Alicia was ninety-eight percent sure most of his “notes” were doodles by now.

“Yea, yea,” Clarke smiled against her will, pulling herself closer to the chair. “I think we might be making some progress though.”

Alicia tilted her head the side, “with what?”

“You answered ‘Lexa of the Trees’, remember?” Clarke was clearly joking, though Alicia could see a bit of pain pulling at the corners of her smile.

It was a complete accident. She’d known that the rest of the name was related to Woods, but she’d long since began throwing out random guesses. Alicia thought Clarke would get a kick out of Lexa of the Trees, but when she instead perked up, hope lighting her entire being, Alicia felt like the worst person on the planet. Her stomach sank to her shoes as she told Clarke that it’d been a joke and watched as the girl crumpled like a house of cards.

“Yea,” Alicia bit her lip, looking around the room as if it could give her a way to change the subject. “Is cereal a soup?”

They then began arguing over the definition of soup, then leading into why a hamburger was not a sandwich and neither was a hot dog. The hour left whittled away as the two laughed over the argument until, moments before Dr. Griffin came to retrieve them, Jackson said, extremely calmly: “Is mayonnaise and instrument?” The two girls further dissolved into laughter. Alicia didn’t notice the shocked look on Dr. Griffins face at her daughter laughing so carefree, or the small, happy smile at the sight before being lead to group discussion. It was a normal day.

Henri arrived at the house, six o’clock on the dot, ready to bring his kids home for dinner when Alicia noticed the thick layer of snow that had fallen. The first snow fall of the season to stick. She begged Henri to let her walk home. It wasn’t far, she’d dressed for the possibility, and what could possibly happen? So Henri agreed and her brothers piled into the car, quick goodbyes given to their respective outsiders, Ivy dawdling like she always did. Though, this time, she even gave Jasper a peck on the cheek. Alicia wasn’t sure if the sick feeling in her stomach was from the chemotherapy. They drove away and Alicia gave Clarke a quick hug, not seeing Clarke’s surprise, forgetting this was the first time she’d actually hugged Clarke. Instead, she let go, gave a smile and quick goodbye before beginning the walk.

Sure, Alicia took the long way home; winter was her favorite season, she loved snow, and her family understood this. No one would worry, as long as she didn’t take _too_ long. She had her cell phone on her, in case she got tired, but physical activity had never tired her before, at least not to the point of being unable to continue. She didn’t go near the gates, though. She knew better than that, the last time being when she was thirteen and only because she was excited to see a new face. After the experience, Alicia became uncomfortably aware of the guns holstered at the officer’s hips. She didn’t go near the gates, she went through the park.

The park, where people had picnics and played sports, was always safe; Pleasantview was always safe. The walk through the park to the residential side was deserted, even during the summer months, since most people drove their cars or bikes or roller blades or skate boards, because the path was made of gravel more like large pebbles making it almost impossible to ride on without hurting yourself. The path was close to the fence, the border of the community, the large smooth expanse of white impossible to scale with invisible doors only entered by hand-print recognition, and the other side of the path was walled with thick brush and trees. Once on the path, you could only move forward or back.

Alicia made her way down the path, her footprints the first to blemish the fresh snow. Then someone yelled at her. She turned around to see an officer, coming out of the fence, which closed, turning the doorway invisible once again. Alicia blinked in shock; officers weren’t supposed to come into the community unless there was an emergency. Was there an emergency? There weren’t sirens, though. Did Alicia miss something? She’d only been out of the house for fifteen minutes, right? What could've possibly happened so quickly that wouldn't warrant sirens?

The officer stalked towards her and Alicia took a hesitant step back. He looked angry. Angrier than any person Alicia had seen before. He yelled gibberish at her, but a voice in the back of her head told her this wasn’t gibberish. She’d heard this before. He was ten feet away and Alicia saw the gun in his hand. That was the same language Anya had spoken the morning of her tenth birthday. The officer continued yelling at her, advancing on her, and Alicia quickly began walking backwards, not wanting to put her back to the man.

“I don’t know what you’re saying!” She yelled, but it seemed to only make him angrier.

His yelling got louder. Alicia continued backing away, but she backed into a tree. She tried to turn around the tree, instead pushed away by the spikey bushes. Then came a sound louder than anything Alicia had heard before and a pain stronger than any other erupted in her stomach.

She looked down at her stomach, the white of her shoot blooming red, but, suddenly, her shirt wasn’t white anymore. It was a mottled gray and as soft as baby hair. She looked up to see her crazed attacker and, for a second, he was the officer, looking at his gun in horror, but then he was a bald man in robes.

 _Titus_.

She didn’t know a Titus.

 _Yes, she did_.

Was he her father?

 _No, mentor_. _Titus and Anya, mentors, teachers. A traitor and a sister._

The pain brought Alicia’s body to her knees, but she was separate from her body. Her mind melded and divided and expanded and contracted and she was screaming, but she was whispering and she was warm, but she’d fallen in snow, and she felt loved, but she was alone, and it was quiet, but officers were swarming her and it was calm, but she was in an ambulance surrounded by paramedics asking millions of questions, and she was close to dying, but people were saying she would be fine. Finally, an EMT put a mask over her face and the memory and reality playing simultaneously came to the same conclusion: darkness enveloped her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PLEASE DON'T HATE ME I SWEAR SHE IS FINE  
> PLEASE LEAVE KUDOS AND COMMENTS I LOVE THEM!!!  
> (also this may end up being six chapters instead of five...we'll see)


	5. For the Love of Ignorance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She remembers, but who is she?

Lexa (Alicia?) sat in her hospital bed alone. The room was empty and the door closed, preventing any noise from the hall to come into the room. She was supposed to be resting, but the bed was too lumpy and the blankets scratched her skin and Alicia (Lexa?) didn’t think it was possibly, but it was too quiet. Staring at the white walls, without any sort of stimuli, memories she didn’t want continued to flash before her. Each time, she hoped it would be the last, but there were always more.

She hated it. She hated the way her own mind fought over her name. She hated how violent the memories were: she killed children, trained more to be killers, _demanded Tommy’s execution_ , but he’d killed eighteen innocent people and she had to, but her stomach curled on itself at the thought and she hated the person who belonged to these memories, but that person was also her. She hated remembering the loved ones she lost: Anya, Gustus, Costia…Clarke.

She hated remembering Clarke. She hated knowing exactly how long she loved her. She hated kissing her. She hated the look on Clarke’s face at her betrayal and she hated the betrayal. She hated their first meeting after three months. She hated the duel that Clarke watched. She hated the way Clarke still obviously cared about her, coming to her room to bandage her hand.

She hated that the emotions associated with the memories became hers so completely that she actually missed Clarke, felt sorry for leaving her to deal with a crumbling government.

She hated that a part of her still loved Clarke, because that part of her was the reason she was sitting in an outsiders’ hospital being treated by outsider doctors and her family wasn’t allowed to visit her until Dr. Griffin evaluated exactly how much she remembered.

She already knew that she remembered too much to return to life in Pleasantview. She wondered how much Ivy knew, no use denying the fact that Ivy was definitely remembering now. She didn’t recognize Ivy from any of the past life memories now assaulting her, but she recognized Jasper and hoped that Ivy happened to be a delinquent she never met or someone else from Skaikru. Her mannerisms, however. Her sudden fear and love for the outside and art. Ivy might know enough to move outside as well and, though the past month left her wishing for Ivy to not, she selfishly hoped Ivy did remember. She didn’t want to be alone. Then again, she didn’t want her parents to lose another daughter. Her heart hurt at remembering her parents.

“…Lexa?” The voice was almost quiet enough to be mistaken for timid, but Clarke was still too strong for such an adjective. Clarke stood at the doorway of the hospital room, door partly open.

“Don’t call me that.” Clarke’s face fell and she entered fully, closing the door behind her.

“I’m sorry, the paramedics believed you were remembering, you were speaking Tri-” Clarke stopped herself from giving information the girl in the hospital bed was not supposed to know.

 _“Trigedasleng. I do remember, Klark kom Skaikru_.” The words of a language she’d not spoken in sixteen years were clear and strong and familiar, spoken like Lexa, but she didn’t feel like Lexa. She didn’t feel like a powerful ruler of her people, but she didn’t feel like Alicia, either. She wasn’t the young girl who climbed trees in the park and let her older sister braid her hair for fun. She didn’t know who she was anymore.

The elation on Clarke’s face made her feel a little better, but also a little angrier. Clarke _wanted_ her to remember all the horrible things she’d done, had gone through in their last life. Why would anyone wish that upon a person?

“That’s great!” The wounded girl scowled at Clarke’s words. Clarke’s voice went softer; she moved towards the bed, taking a chair, reminiscent of their times in the room in Pleasantview. Her eyebrows furrowed. “What’s wrong?”  
“I didn’t want to remember,” her words were hissed, full of anguish and anger. Her hands clenched into fists at her sides. “Do you realize what this means?”

“Lexa-”

“Don’t _call me that!_ ” The emotions were getting mixed up and confusing, because at that moment she hated Clarke. She hated Clarke like she hated Queen Nia, but she loved the sky girl at the same time. Clarke sat back in her chair, slightly wide eyed. Taking calming breaths, she unclenched her hands, refusing to look at Clarke, whispering, “You’ve already taken everything from me, please respect that I do not wish to be called that.”

“What are you talking about?!” Clarke exclaimed, clearly offended. “Remembering who you used to be is taking everything from you? _Seriously?!_ Do you realize how much people miss you? Your mom, your dad, Anya, Aden, Gustus, fuck, I was even able to find Costia. We all care about you! Do you realize how heartbreaking it is to realize who you are, who you love, and learn they don’t have _one goddamn clue_ who you are?!”

“Do you realize that I now know that I killed my own brother?” She hissed angrily.

“You don’t have a-”

“Tommy,” she interrupted, “is my brother. I’ve grown up with him, I love him, and, now, I don’t think I could even look at him.” The tightness of Clarke’s shoulders loosened. “Good thing is, I won’t have to, because people who remember can’t live in communities. I just got shot by an outsider, who I can’t remember in my past life, so I still don’t understand his motivation, and now I have to go live among them, all the while knowing that everyone I pass could’ve potentially met their death because of me.”

Clarke seemed confused suddenly, “What do you mean you don’t understand his motivation? You got shot trying to leave the gates.” The wounded girl shook her head slightly and Clarke continued, somewhat frantically. “Yes, you did. You remembered and, forgetting about this life, thought you needed to escape and attacked an officer at the gates.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. I started remembering _after_ I got shot. Plus, I wasn’t anywhere near the gates, I was on the path through the park.”

Clarke’s face paled. “That wasn’t…that wasn’t what Apollo said.”

Apollo. She considered the name for a second. Why did it sound familiar?

“Wasn’t he a man…he interrupted Ascension Day,” She recalled. “He’s an Outsider, though, even as an officer he couldn’t know I lived in Pleasantview, my official name is still Alicia Clark.” Ironically enough. “Only the Reincarnation Agency higher ups know.”

“My mother is actually good friends with him now,” Clarke’s voice sounded almost exactly as it did the first few days of her stay at Polis Tower. “She may have told him.”

She didn’t really understand what point Clarke was trying to make.

“I think my mom may have strayed a bit from her approved experiment plan.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...you horrible, horrible people. I do not have TIME for a long WIP!! Despite my better judgement, however, I am making this A LITTLE BIT longer than planned. JUST A LITTLE BIT.  
>  anyway, please leave a comment, I love reading them.


	6. Lost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lexa attempts a pointless endeavor.

Clarke walked into the hospital with a USB in her pocket that made her eye each security guard nervously and slip into Lexa’s (no, not Lexa, she doesn’t want to be called Lexa. Alicia? She didn’t particularly like _that_ either. Honestly, Clarke was still guiltily glad she remembered) room. The girl sat up in the bed, tapping away at the laptop Clarke brought her; if nothing else, she was enjoying uncensored internet.

“I am going on record to say these were way too easy to get,” Clarke passed the USB that held all the security cam footage for the day she was shot. “Are you sure they wouldn’t have doctored them?”

She shook her head as she plugged the USB into the laptop, “No way. They’re gonna think I’m too excited about remembering to call them out on it. No one even looks at these tapes anyway, Mo-…Adyna once told me they delete the videos every three months.” The file containing the videos opened and she began scrolling through, trying to find the camera with eyes on the park trail. “Plus, saying you need the videos for your mother’s research is a perfect excuse.”

Clarke laughed awkwardly, “Yeah. It would’ve been. Except I didn’t use it.”

Her head shot up from looking at the laptop, “Then how the hell-You knew them, don’t you?”

Clarke shook her head, “No, but I think she knew me; practically threw the USB at me.”

“Great, nice to know life’s going to go right back to the way it was.”

She was pissed, Clarke could clearly tell; surprising, since Clarke barely even knew who this girl was anymore. At least with Alicia, things were similar; sure, she was sarcastic at times and childish in a way Lexa never could be, but she was resilient and strong. While Lexa was rigid in places Alicia was soft, healing from wounds Alicia never had, the girl laying in the hospital bed was the worst parts of both. The girl was bitter, like Alicia was towards anything to do with the outsiders. Fury burned in her in a way Clarke once saw in Lexa, but without the years of leadership and control. Her memories returned to her in violent fragments, giving her just enough understanding to label her an outsider now, but not nearly enough to ache for the people she’d loved like Clarke did on her tenth birthday, like the way almost everyone did once they turned ten. Clarke once heard of a boy sneaking out of his house and going cross-country riding cargo trains like a movie runaway to find his best friend, who, luckily, was an eleven year old who remembered him.

“If you mean like the Past Life, that isn’t true,” Clarke said. “Sure, my reputation sometimes precedes me, but it’s more like getting a second chance in a world that doesn’t expect anything of us.” Clarke pushed down her rising emotions; the girl stopped scrolling through the files. “It’s a chance to heal and be the people we wanted to be.”

“I’m sorry.” A pause. “I’m glad you got a second chance.” She went back to the scrolling through the files while Clarke wanted to scream.

Scream and cry and break something, because this was all her fault. If Abby hadn’t seen how upset Clarke was, maybe this experiment wouldn’t have happened. This happened all the time, people didn’t remember and no one knew why. Barely anyone even tried to change it anymore, but after Charlotte, Clarke somehow got it into her head that maybe Lexa would remember. Anya hadn’t been so optimistic.

Clarke’s phone rang, suddenly. Fumbling to pull it out of her pocket, Clarke looked up to gesture to it, but the girl didn’t even look at her. She sat in the bed, scrolling through hundreds of different videos, looking for footage Clarke didn’t really understand why she wanted. It wouldn’t change anything.

“Are you gonna get that?” She asked, still not looking at Clarke.

“Uh…yea,” Clarke slipped out of the room.

Closing the door behind her, she sighed and leant against it, at the same time swiping and putting the phone up to her ear without checking the Caller ID.

“Hello?”

“What the fuck, Griffin?” Anya.

“Nice to hear you, too, Anya.”

“When the _hell_ were you going to tell me Lexa remembered?”

Wait. “How did you find out?”

“It’s all over the _fucking_ news! You got her shot? Again?!”

Low blow. “I didn’t get her shot,” my mom might have. “I was going to tell you when she was actually okay with all of this.”

“…what do you mean?”

“She isn’t...she doesn’t like being called Lexa, but she doesn’t want to be called Alicia either. The name she-”

“Yea, yea, the name she chose, you told me all of this. But she remembers.”

“Not…exactly,” Clarke ran a hand through her hair. Passing nurses glanced at her oddly. “She has most of her memories, I think, just none of the feelings.”

“I don’t think I understand.”

“Like, she knows who I am and who you are and how we fit into her past life, but she doesn’t care.”

“She doesn’t care? At all?”

“Well, she cares about remembering. Except she’s pissed.”

_“What?!”_

“She wants to go back to live in Pleasantview, but she knows she can’t and she hates it. They put her in a family with Finn! Finn and Maya who’s remembering her past life, but at the same time forgetting this one which is another incredible fuck up I don’t know how we managed and Lincoln which just makes Octavia upset all the time because he has no clue who she is and Murphy who had no connection to her in the past, but they’re all her siblings now! Kane and Indra are her parents, she loves them like her parents, and they don’t remember shit, and we’re taking all of that away from her!” Clarke took a breath from her yelling; the people in the hallway looked scared. “I really screwed up this time Anya.”

“You always screw up.” Good ol’ Anya. “But it’ll all work out in the end. She’ll move in with me, on the farm, and we can slowly transition her back to life here. That was the plan.”

“I haven’t even told her about your parents,” Clarke realized.

Anya went silent. “This wasn’t supposed to happen this way, Clarke. There was a plan.”

“Since when has she ever stuck to a plan?”

Anya laughed a little. “She always said a plan never survived five minutes in battle.”

The two had bonded when Clarke was eleven, the first time she tried to find Lexa online, but the only Woods she could find was Anya Woods, an angry sixteen year old living on her family farm two months after a car accident killed both her parents in one go. Together, they found others and figured out who lived in the communities; some were obviously harder to let go than others.

The window on Clarke’s left, the blinds blocking anyone from looking in to her room, shattered. Clarke jumped away from the glass, heart pounding, to see a black laptop laying amongst the wreckage and sobs coming from within the room. Everyone turned to look at the scene, stunned. Clarke hung up the phone and rushed into the room to see the girl hugging her knees sobbing. Rushing to her side, Clarke sat on the bed an arm going around the girl’s back which she surprisingly let.

“What’s wrong?” Clarke asked. “What happened?”

“They deleted the video,” she choked out. “Everything was there, except a two hour delay. They-they just…” she dissolved once again, leaning heavily on Clarke. “I just want to go home.”

Clarke closed her eyes, swallowing her own pain, “I know. I know.”


End file.
